The Silver Skates (film)

On Christmas Eve, 1899, Imperial Saint Petersburg's frozen rivers and canals transform the capital city into a fairytale-like wonderland, with bustling festivities on the ice.

Pure-hearted 18-year-old Matvey Polyakov is an ice-skating courier of a local bakery, renowned for his speed. He is the fastest thanks to the special silver skates inherited from his father, a lamplighter.

The tsarist minister Nikolai Vyazemsky's daughter Alisa Vyazemskaya is interested in chemistry and the world of science, but is forced to hide her hobbies from her father, who, like many Russian aristocrats of that time, believes that a woman doesn’t need a higher education at all.

A few days before the dawn of the 20th century, Matvey loses his job as a deliveryman, because he could not deliver the order on time, as the street enroute was blocked for the Vyazemskys driving along it. At the same time, he discovers that his father has consumption. At the hospital the doctor tells Matvey that there is a chance of a costly cure for his father in Germany.

By chance, Matvey meets a group of pickpockets led by "Alex" named the Ice Gang, all of whom are fascinated by Marx's ideas about expropriation. Although struggling financially and unable to afford his father's treatment, Matvey trains with the Ice Gang to learn how to pickpocket in order to pay for his father's treatment. The gang challenges Matvey to steal into the Vyazemsky mansion. Matvey climbs onto Alisa's balcony where they accidentally stumble upon each other.

After some time, Matvey steals two invitations to a ball on ice in the courtyard of the Saint Michael's Castle, where he goes with Alex, posing as aristocrats. Alisa, as an aristocrat, is also there; she is introduced at the ball to the captain of the guard, Count Arkady Trubetskoy, her betrothed. Alisa and Matvey meet again and make a deal: Alisa won't reveal Matvey's disguise, but he must give permission for Alisa to enter the Bestuzhev Courses as a student: according to the law of the time, this requires the consent of a male companion or her father. Although Dmitri Mendeleev himself endorses Alisa's candidacy at the entrance exam, the idea fails, because the consent must be submitted in writing, and Matvey cannot write.

Matvey's father rejects the money because of the dishonest way his son got it. Matvey quarrels with him and goes to live with Alex, who, together with his gang for the winter, huddles in the wreck of an old ship frozen into the ice on the coast of the Gulf of Finland.

On Christmas, Matvey, using the fact that Alisa's parents are at the ball, persuades her to go on a date with him. The two of them skate along the canals and finally realize that they are in love with each other. The next day, Alex's gang at the fair is attacked by a specially trained squad of guards led by the Count, as the Ice Gang's actions have long attracted the attention of the city authorities. One guard manages to grab one of its members, while Matvey begins to pursue the Count, but Alex comes to his aid, who shoots the Count's leg with a pistol. Matvey decides to return home, where he finds his father has died.

On the same evening, Alisa appears at the performance of the French magician Fourier, who performs a trick with flames and tells the audience that the flames come from the "energy between Arkady and Alisa". Alisa considers this a stupid farce and explains Fourier's trick to the public. Her enraged father searches her room, and finds her scientific books. They are burned, and Alisa's governess, the prim Englishwoman Miss Jackson, is fired. Miss Jackson decides that Alisa has inspired her to choose what she truly wants in life and not what other wants, and encourages Alisa to make those decisions as well even if they are difficult.

Alisa runs away from home to try to escape to Paris, where she can study chemistry freely. She finds Matvey on the ship and asks him to come with her. But then, the ship is surrounded by the Prince and his soldiers, and a confrontation between them the Ice Gang, whose members have been captured by the Prince, begins. Alex sacrifices his life to save Matvey, who nearly dies of hypothermia before being taken to a hospital.

New Year is coming. Alisa, who was returned home, is mentally broken. She learns that her father gave full consent to her marriage with Prince Arkady Trubetskoy. On the occasion of the New Year, Nikolai brings her to a masquerade ball at the Great Gatchina Palace. Unexpectedly, she meets Matvey in disguise, and they decide to finally escape to Paris together, using the two tickets Matvey acquired. But Matvey dropped one of the tickets, and the Prince, finding the ticket, realizes their plan and chases after them. At the Vitebsky railway station, discovering the missing ticket, Matvey persuades Alisa to get on the train, and he himself runs to the ticket offices to buy a new one, but then the Prince appears on the platform with the missing ticket. In the ensuing fight, Matvey manages to take away the ticket and he manages to jump onto the train, but Arkady manages to finally shoot him. The bullet hits the silver skates instead, and Matvey and Alisa make it to Paris.

Four years later, Nikolai Vyazemsky comes to Dmitri Mendeleev and tells him he knows that he is in secret correspondence with his daughter. The proud Mendeleev tells him that Alisa has made great strides in the study of chemistry and in a year will receive an academic degree, which will allow her to work in all prestigious universities in the West. Realizing that this is the only way to return his daughter to her homeland, Vyazemsky asks the directorate of the university, where the Bestuzhev Courses are held, to amend the charter, thanks to which from now on women will be able to head the department. A year later, he watches Alisa teach a chemistry lesson in a class. The film ends with a scene in which Alisa, Matvey and their little son Petya, named after his late paternal grandfather, are ice skating together.[15]

• Fedor Fedotov as Matvey Polyakov

Matvey is a poor lamplighter's son, his only treasure an inherited silver-plated skates. Matvey dreams of winning Alisa's heart, the two star-crossed due to their differing social statuses. He introduces her to his world, where you can just be happy without any conventions. When simple courtship is no longer enough, he enters into a struggle for his beloved with a court careerist.

• Sonya Priss as Alisa Vyazemskaya (English: Alice Maria Augusta von Schlesenberg-Vyazemskaya)

Alisa, a major dignitary's daughter, deeply interested in science. She learns that she is going to marry Prince Arkady Trubetskoy. When she becomes acquainted with Matvey, a simple lamplighter's son, Alisa re-evaluates her own life and decides on the impossible, it seemed, for a representative of high society - hand in hand with a lover - a commoner to fulfill a cherished desire.

• Kirill Zaytsev as Captain Count Arkady Trubetskoy, an officer of the Guard Department (also tr. Arkadiy)
• Yuri Borisov as Alexey Tarasov, the leader of the pickpocket by Alex gang, the ice skating thieves.

Alex is a marxist who justifies his crimes by the fact that he steals from the rich, thus expropriating what was expropriated from the poor.

• Aleksei Guskov as Minister Nikolai Nikolaevich Vyazemsky in the government of the Russian Empire, and Alisa Vyazemskaya's father.
• Severija Janusauskaite as Severina Genrikhovna, Alisa's stepmother
• Yuri Kolokolnikov as Grand prince
• Timofey Tribuntsev as Pyotr Polyakov (English: Petr), a lamplighter, Matvey Polyakov's father
• Alexandra Revenko as Margo, Alex's girlfriend and the ice gang leaders.
• Vasily Kopeikin as a member of the Mukha gang (English: Muha), a man ice skating.
• Mikhail Shelomentsev as a member of the Graf, a pickpocket on skates.
• Bato Shoinjonov as Genghis, a member of the Yakut, a pickpocket on skates.
• Sergey Koltakov as Dmitri Mendeleev, a scientist
• Cathy Belton as Miss Jackson, Alisa's governess
• Margarita Adaeva as Praskovia, Alisa's maid
• Denis Lavant as Fourier, an illusionist
• Dmitry Lysenkov as a doctor
• Valery Kukhareshin as a senior chef at Le Grand Pie
• Sergey Barkovsky as a principal of the Bestuzhev Courses
• Elena Rufanova as Princess Trubetskaya, mother of Prince Arkady Trubetskoy
• Vasily Shchipitsyn as a policeman at the crossroads from the Saint Petersburg Police

The film was called "scandalous" by journalists because of the initiation of a case by Rosprirodnadzor (Federal Service for Supervision of Natural Resources). The residents of St. Petersburg were initially surprised to see how public utilities cleared snow from the ice at the Moyka River,[25] Kryukov Canal and Griboyedov Canal were covered with blue wooden slabs and film studio agents appeared nearby.[26][27] The paint from these slabs allegedly penetrated the ice and then polluted the water.

The original film soundtrack was composed by Guy Farley and recorded by the London Symphony Orchestra at Abbey Road Studios,[29][30] is composed of 24 numbers, 2 of which directly quote the famous piano piece Moonlight by Claude Debussy, arranged for orchestra.

The film also uses fragments of works by Johann Sebastian Bach's Fugue g-moll BWV 578, String Quartet No. 3 (Part III) and String Quartet No. 51 op. 64 No. 4 (Part I) by Joseph Haydn, Nocturne No. 13 H 60 by John Field, Piano Sonata No. 2 WWV 21 (Part II) by Richard Wagner, The Skaters' Waltz by Emil Waldteifel.

The Final Waltz from the ballet The Nutcracker by Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Scene with dances from the Prologue of the ballet The Sleeping Beauty. The waltz - Tales from the Vienna Woods and Roses from the South by Johann Strauss the Son. Russian Easter Festival Overture, Op. 36; The dance of buffoons from the opera The Snow Maiden by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov.

• List of Christmas films

• Official website (in English)
• The Silver Skates on Netflix
• The Silver Skates at IMDb